1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to cleaning articles, for example, those of a wiper type, of which the electrostatic ability to adsorb dust has been especially improved.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various cleaning articles for daily housecleaning are known in the art. Such cleaning articles typically comprise fibers for collecting dust. For examples, the fibers are made into a nonwoven fabric and this nonwoven fabric is attached to a holding device; or the fibers are formed into yarns and these yarns are disposed on the cleaning surface of the cleaning article; or the fibers are disposed, without forming either nonwoven fabrics or yarns, on the cleaning surface of the cleaning article.
In the process of producing the fibers that includes the steps of spinning, drawing, crimping, drying, etc., and in the process of producing cleaning articles with use of fibers, if the fibers are electrostatically charged, they will adhere to the production line and often discharge to the metallic part of the production line, thereby causing trouble in production. Therefore, in general, an antistatic agent is applied to the fibers in the step of spinning them to thereby prevent the fibers from being electrostatically charged, and the thus-processed fibers are then fed to the production line of cleaning articles.
Heretofore, for the antistatic agent, generally used are ionic surfactants such as anionic or cationic surfactants. Processed with the surfactant, the fibers are smooth-faced, and they are hardly charged by friction. In addition, they are made to have the ability to absorb moisture on their surface so as to allow free movement of electrons on their surface, and are thereby prevented from being statically electrified.
When such ionic surfactants of which the ability to prevent static electrification is high are adhered to fibers, it will solve the problem of static electrification in the production line of fibers. However, when the thus-processed fibers are used in cleaning articles, and when the cleaning articles comprising them are used, for example, for wiping floors, the fibers could not be electrostatically charged by friction and therefore could not electrostatically adsorb fine trash such as dust, dirt, hair, etc.
Therefore, in general, after the cleaning articles comprising the surfactant-processed fibers are fabricated, liquid paraffin, paraffin wax, adhesive resin or the like is applied onto their cleaning surface so as to increase the cleaning ability of the articles. Owing to the adhesive power of the paraffin or the like applied thereto, the cleaning articles can adsorb dust, dirt, etc. However, since the liquid paraffin and others are sticky, they will stick to floors, furniture and glass wiped with the cleaning articles, and will rather soil them. This is one problem with the cleaning articles.
In addition, if the fibers coated with the surfactant in the spinning step are too much smooth-faced, they could not be well bundled when formed into a tow. If so, the tow will loosen in the crimping step, and the fibers constituting it could not be uniformly crimped. Further, while the tow is conveyed in the initial stage in the production line of cleaning articles, the fibers constituting it will also loosen. This is another problem with the cleaning articles.